Tag Archives: ricotta “meat” balls

On the way back from the shore, we passed through long low fields of blueberry bushes, crazed orchards of wildly tangled peach trees, fields of dry golden wheat, and fields of corn, vivid and green, but still only as high as an elephant shrew’s eye. We bought some (obviously not very local) corn cobs anyway, despite the fact that Isaac currently only has one front tooth. The boys sat in the back yard and husked it. The soft pale corn silk covered everything, clinging like spiders’ webs. Today I tried to clear it away, but I couldn’t do it. I stood with a silky tangle of strands in my hand, and I thought that this morning it feels impossible to clean them away completely. But I know they’ll be gone, without my even noticing, they’ll dry up and blow away, or another rain storm will reduce them to pulp and they’ll disappear into the earth. And I thought about the winter, about how in January I’d probably like to find a wispy fragment of corn silk, because it would remind me of summer, but I won’t because it will all be gone. And that’s what summer is like.

Beet balls

Beets beets and more beets from the CSA! I wanted to do something different with them, other than just roasting them. Well, I roasted them, and then I mixed them with a batter of semolina flour and ricotta and dropped them in some hot olive oil. Beet balls! I thought they were delicious, and the boys liked them a lot, too. Light and tender on the inside, crispy on the outside. I flavored them with smoked paprika and a pinch of nutmeg. They’d be nice with any kind of sauce, either to serve them in or to dip them in. A creamy nut sauce, a simple tomato sauce, a pesto, a spicy catsup,